Unknown - Cat_In_A_Midnight_Choir-spaces_ru

“What is the matter, Louie?” She backs off, puzzled, her adorable little muzzle all wrinkled like a shar pei’s, who are not so adorable.

Then she runs into herself in the dressing table mirror.

“I bet it is the wig! You did not want all this blond Dynel rubbing on your whiskers. Well, this is history. For now.”

She strips off the Lauren Bacall “do” to reveal her own sassy curls all crushed beneath. This girl could use a good grooming, but my tongue is not for hire. I have enough square footage of my own to tend to.

“These are wild,” she says vaguely in my direction.

I hear a click and then the large silver ring on her forearm snicks open.

All is forgiven! An armload of cat toys!

I bound from the bed and leap into action, batting, snagging, toothing.

“Louie! These are borrowed goods. Let go. No! Bad boy! Please!”

That is Miss Temple’s idea of domestic discipline, all right. She wields the Carrot of Cajolery and the Big Stick of Superior Force in such rapid turns that a guy could commit sixteen felonies or hara kiri while she was making up her mind whether to slap or tickle him.

She hangs my playthings on the top of the ajar closet door.

“I agree,” she tells me, “that those skimpy string monokinis would make ideal cat toys, but I need them for my undercover work.”

Perhaps she meant uncovered work.

I decide right then that despite my misgivings about Miss Midnight Louise I had better keep an eye on Miss Temple and her midnight ramblings.

So much for taking on a partner. Now I am stuck with a partner missing in action and the previous case of the stripper killer heating up and no one at hand to lend a mitt in either instance.

Perhaps I shall have to hone my delegating skills further, first thing tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Miss Temple has totally thrown off her undercover persona to slip under the covers with yours truly. It is while we are rubbing noses and murmuring sweet little nothings that I resolve to defy logic and physical science and pursue two cases at once.

Did You Ever See a Dream Walking?

Temple often thanked her checkered employment history for a brief detour into the thespian arts.

That explained how she was able to call Molina the next morning, as innocent and bright as sunshine.

“I’ve been thinking about what you said about Max,” she began.

“Good.”

“Maybe not.”

“For you or for me?”

“Well, the thing is” — Temple hated people who used “the thing is,” and hoped Molina did too; would bet that Molina did too — “the thing is, I need to know the exact time that Cher Smith was killed.”

“Why?”

“Well, it could be that I know where Max was, and was not, at that time.”

“That night? You remember the timetable of that night?”

“He told me about it the next day.”

“The killing?” Molina sounded ready to leap through the phone.

“Noooo. Just about meeting Cher. But if I knew the exact time that Cher Smith was accosted and killed the next night, I might be able to…make more sense of what I do know. You know?”

The silence on the phone line said that Molina definitely did not know.

Good. Temple wanted the homicide lieutenant’s frustration level high enough to override her better instincts.

“Are you there?” Temple said. “Look, I’m not even sure I should be calling you.” Whined.

“Me too,” Molina finally answered. “That’s privileged information. Time of death. Besides, it’s not an exact science.”

“I know. I heard that on C.S.I. Isn’t that a cool show?”

“No. Their depiction of forensic work is wildly improbable. Forensics people don’t play amateur detective and interview witnesses and suspects. We do that.”

Temple relished being the object of that short, biting tone. The madder Molina got, the more disgusted, the more she’d play right into Temple’s hands. Or ears, in this case.

“Well, I’m not asking for court evidence here. Just a time. An hour. You know. When? Elevenish? Twelvish? One-ish?”

“How about two-ish,” Molina gritted through her teeth.

Temple smiled like the Cheshire Cat. “Two-ish, it is. We would need a hyphen in that, though.”

“Hyphen?”

“Between two and ish. To look right.”

“I don’t care how it looks, that’s the time Cher was attacked. So. Are you going to give Kinsella an alibi? Was he caressing your lily white body at the time?”

“Lieutenant! That is soooo personal a question to ask. And pure speculation. You have no idea what shade my body is. There are always self-tanning lotions. Two A.M. I’ll have to check my diary to be sure.”

“Is that just an expression, or do you really keep one?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out,” Temple said. “With a warrant,” she added in a throaty growl. “G’bye!” Snippy Weakest Link tone of voice.

Whew! What a workout for an amateur actress.

She stared at the notebook she always kept by her phone and compulsively doodled on while talking. The number 2 and the capital P.M. were prominent on the pages, outlined by the tilted, houselike shape of the constellation Ophiuchus.

But the two things were not connected: the stripper killing and the Synth. Were they?

Whatever the case, Temple knew more than she had, and more than Molina meant for her to know. That was one thing Temple had learned from Lindy last night: the exact time when Cher was accosted was very important. Now all Temple had to find out was who might have been crossing that parking lot at the same exact time, besides Max Kinsella, who she did soooo not want to be guilty. If Molina was out to see that Rafi Nadir would walk, Temple was determined to see him walking across the right “wrong” parking lot at 2:00 A.M.

Even if the shoe, or glove, fits, you must not call it quits.

Ritz Cracker

“I can see,” says my dear Miss Temple, “why strippers are so eager to get out of these blasted outfits.”

I can see a lot more of my dear Miss Temple than I am accustomed to, but I shut my eyes and try not to think of that noxious Egyptian hairless breed of my kind known as a sphinx. I suppose the Sphinx itself is hairless, probably due to endless sandblasting.

I am sorry to say that even my Miss Temple, left alone with a ring of fifty strip-tease artists’ tools of the trade cannot resist slipping into a little nothing in front of her bedroom mirror.

I suppose the most admirable and sensible female harbors a bit of unwholesome curiosity about how well she would pass as a femme fatale. I blame the media.

Still, it is no pleasant task to recline upon our communal couch and watch her preen and pose with such ridiculous articles of nonclothing. Worst of all, she is wearing my shoes as an accessory to the crime!

She turns the radio up to a deafening level. It is a rock oldies station playing something with a chorus of “She works hard for the money.”

Miss Temple works hard to look like a stripper.

I flatten my ears against the sight and the sound.

At last she turns off the radio and sighs, which is more than I can manage.

“Not even the Midnight Louie shoes can add any class to this outfit,” she admits. “I guess I am stuck being Miss Modesto of 1958.”

With that she goes through what looks like a straitjacket escape act as she unwinds the assorted elastics before donning her usual underthings, which I find skimpy enough to begin with. What a relief. It is a good thing that I do not talk to humans on principle, as I could certainly shock Miss Temple Barr’s friends, coworkers, neighbors, lovers, and enemies with a breathless fashion report on her brief entry into exiting her clothes.

Soon she has donned the long, yellow wig as one would a hat, were one human and had ears oddly placed in the center of one’s skull instead of proudly rampant at the top, like the lordly lions on a coat of arms.